Ideas for resource contention

jasonrohrer · 2019-04-23 02:49:56

As I've said many times, I want your decisions in the game to matter, at all levels. I want running a successful village to be hard, and I want you to care enough to get good at handling that challenge. I want town leadership to be necessary, because the challenge is so difficult, and I want disagreements and politics to unfold around that leadership. I want the survival of your family to really matter to you.

And somehow, I want the survival of your family to really matter to you NOW, in this life, and not based on benefits that are going to happen in future lives (like the ability to return to the same village and work on your own pet projects). That particular part may be impossible, so I may have to bend the design a little bit... but I want your family to really matter to you, and I want you to prioritize its survival over the survival of other families, when push comes to shove.

Why?

Because such things will create interesting and varied stories. There are already lots of interesting life stories coming out of the game, and I'm extremely proud of that fact, and I love those stories. But I want MORE. I want to turn that crazy/interesting story knob until it twists all the way off. I want no two lives to ever be the same. Not even a little bit the same. Not even similar.

Think about it this way: if your family really matters to you, that doesn't mean that family survival drama or conflict with other families will necessarily be part of every life you live. You may live some lives where your family is in isolation, and has sufficient resources, and it simply never comes up. However, it means that it will be possible, and thus part of some of the lives you live. Oh, in this one life, there was this other family pushing into our village and taking our land, and we had to decide what to do about it. One more type of story.

And that story, as one example, doesn't currently ever happen in the game. Even if two families were near each other. Same with a story about us losing faith in our leader and deciding collectively to replace them. I'm not saying there should be a necessary leader in every town at every moment, but it should be possible in some towns some of the time.

Likewise with laws, trade, war, etc. I don't want to make a game about those things specifically, but I want those things to occur naturally in the game sometimes. This one time, pressure mounted between two villages, and finally a gasket blew, and we were involved in a full-blown war.

I think that the new property fences are a step in the right direction here, and I myself have already seen some interesting new stories come out of them. I tried to start a private milkweed farm during my life with my kids, and unbeknownst to me, my younger sister tried to do the same thing on the other side of town. Hers was much more successful and ended up flourishing beautifully. Mine ended up pretty much failing by the end of my life. At one point, I had to beg her to borrow a hoe that I needed to get mine off the ground. Then my kids forgot to save seeds from their first crop, so I had to beg her again for seeds to resow. It was actually a bit humiliating, and it made me jealous, and I thought briefly about killing her and taking over her farm. Anyway, it was a new story. Normally, I'd just walk over and pick the milkweed, or grab the hoe. Having to ask, and having her trust me, was a new type of story. I also saw a kid come up to my sister and explain that he needed rope to make snares. She had to decide whether to give him rope or not. Good stuff.

Okay, so what's the next step?

Many people have observed that there's no chance for trade or conflict if resources are infinite, or effectively infinite. We'll tackle the "making the family matter" thing another time, but let's consider finite resources here.

Resources aren't infinite in any fixed area of the map. But people can keep going further away from town for more (which becomes impractical eventually) or they can simply move. The map is big enough that it's effectively infinite.

I'm thinking about an RTS game, which is almost never played on an infinite map, and how an infinite map would change things. Instead of fighting your opponent over that central gold vein, you might just explore further out and find another one.

So, some crazy, off-the wall ideas:

1. OHOL played on a finite map.

2. OHOL played on a shrinking map (an island with a rising tide).

The problem with this general approach is squaring it with the current long-term meta arc of the game, which involves civilizations rising and falling in parallel, and new seed civilizations being flung out on the map in "clean slate" areas to give them a chance at bootstrapping.

Imagine joining an RTS game 2 hours in, and starting from scratch, when the other two opponents already had huge civs and had consumed all of the resources already.

Actually, maybe the current long-term arc of the game is a side effect of other design decisions and realities. I don't want to keep players waiting to get born, nor do I want to overburden a few mothers with too many babies (early days of OHOL, there were no birth cool downs, and it was chaos). The current solution is spawning new Eves. But there might be other solutions.

What if there was only ONE Eve on the map at a time? One big family, until it died out? Or two families, at any one time? Or X families, at any one time?

That's the philosophical premise of the game (a single Eve as the root, and a whole map full of families spreading from there). Multiple Eves is a concession to the reality of an irregular player join rate.

Less off-the wall is something where OHOL is always played right around the center, instead of an auto-spiral exploring further and further into fresh territory. Resources will run out, and people will need to go further and further on their own, which will eventually become impractical. Though migration would still be possible. Migration itself is an interesting story, but much more interesting if you're migrating into a civilized area rather than endless wilderness. Early OHOL was effectively played this way, and there was a major milkweed shortage in the middle of the map.

Anyway, a finite or fixed map of some kind could create a new "meta meta" arc in the game, where civilizations rise and fall for a while, and interact and conflict with each other, but eventually the whole thing crashes, and the server wipes the map.

And there's still a question about why anyone would care to fight over the limited resources along the way, up before the meta-meta crash.

Looking for thoughts here.

GreatShawn · 2019-04-23 03:33:54

In the genisis chapter in the bible there are only ever one eve, and the bible is written by god, so if god says there should be one eve then there should be one eve

Tarr · 2019-04-23 03:38:34

I mean as long as it's possible to harm my future play why would I ever clash with another town besides roleplaying reasons? We're seeing these sort of self-inflicted wounds in towns with fences where people are valuing the here and now while leaving their own children's future in jeopardy. As long as I can bounce between places are close I should always open my arms to my neighbors for I can deal with them if they cross the line.

While I think the cross lineage cursing them is sort of dumb I can also understand why it would be done in the first place. At the very least it means people who are from other cities have to be watched more carefully as they hold all the power should they start deciding to kill or mess up a village they roam into. Unfortunately most griefing is still likely to come from within your own family so I'd be more worried about my own kids being bad eggs than a stranger.

I do think the map needs to be much smaller so that resources can actually eventually risk running out. Sure in something like Server three days an Eve was more likely to stumble upon a village but it also meant that she could spawn into an area with 100% risk of failure due to lack of one resource or another. Where the game has established areas it makes sense to fight over who gets to live in X town or trying to trade around with others. Sure it might be less interesting having "hub" cities formed on the map but it means we also have expected areas where people can meet and exchange either goods or words.

I'm not sure where I stand on limited Eves as on one hand too many Eves on a server really dilutes the amount of people spread between areas while on the other hand if my choice was to either play under the surname of someone I dislike or not play at all I'd rather just go spend my time doing something else. If you were to do a limited amount of true Eves I'd like to see some sort of distinct way to split your branch off. Basically something where you have at the very top of the tree Eve Boots, and then you see where the branches break down into the subgroups such as the Berry Boots, or the Tarr Boots. Basically something like all players are Boots, but not all Boots are X.

So basically.

1.) There's no reason for a smart player to do harm onto others.
2.) Fixed map is better than a shrinking map.
3.) In a world with one Eve there should be splits, in a world with many Eves there should be limits.

Grim_Arbiter · 2019-04-23 03:41:11

jasonrohrer wrote:

Less off-the wall is something where OHOL is always played right around the center, instead of an auto-spiral exploring further and further into fresh territory. Resources will run out, and people will need to go further and further on their own, which will eventually become impractical. Though migration would still be possible. Migration itself is an interesting story, but much more interesting if you're migrating into a civilized area rather than endless wilderness. Early OHOL was effectively played this way, and there was a major milkweed shortage in the middle of the map.

Anyway, a finite or fixed map of some kind could create a new "meta meta" arc in the game, where civilizations rise and fall for a while, and interact and conflict with each other, but eventually the whole thing crashes, and the server wipes the map.
And there's still a question about why anyone would care to fight over the limited resources along the way, up before the meta-meta crash.
Looking for thoughts here.

I'm in support of this.

While I like finding a over 7 day old lost town that some eve happened to spawn in (shouts out to kate town) the eve spiral is too damn big jason.

If you had your property fences in the old apocalypse town or 8 eve town, where mostly everyone was gathered, then you would have seen all kinds ove conflict over ownership.

futurebird · 2019-04-23 03:41:31

Not seeing how this leads to going higher up the tech tree, this is more of a fall of civilization scenario than a building one. The idea of a limited map and trying to push people together to fight through scarcity sounds not very fun to me and also not very realistic in some ways. Farming gave people more food than they can eat, advanced farming more food and clothing and other resources than anyone could manage to use. Scarcity will give you conflict and fights maybe wars but it won't give your growth and tech and accomplishment and prosperity.

Maybe a limited map with more upgrades to resources could be good. Or just soften the area ban so people can bum in to each other more.

I'm not really interested in beating other players to a resource I want to help them. That's more fun and right now you can choose to do either.

Booklat1 · 2019-04-23 04:05:39

this is all i've been asking for, a reason to care. thanks

I'll make a comment on variation later, for now some quick suggestions for resource contention and making families matter:

1-finish off ginger and black characters, make mutation harder to occur

2-quality of life tech costing uncommon resources is a great way to divert resources from main production lines

3- maps shouldnt be small, some areas should be blocked by natural features (some removeable)

4-spirals could maybe start over after a while, abandoned cities are an interesthing gameplay

Last edited by Booklat1 (2019-04-23 04:10:25)

A_person_1234 · 2019-04-23 04:12:37

What if the biomes were larger, as in hundreds or thousands of tiles larger than they are now. Different types of cities could form in different biomes. The biomes themselves would obviously need to be tweaked for this to work. You can't have a society with no clay because there's no swamp, there HAS to be a way to get rid of mosquitos in the rainforest, more ways to lower temp in desert and raise it in snow biome etc, some type of rabbit equivalent animal in other biomes for clothing etc. Societies would have to trade resources and different cities would have a different feel. Like a farming town might trade with a mining village for iron.

Thaulos · 2019-04-23 04:16:44

Resources can be made to be infinite long term but finite on the short term. You can have mines regenerate iron over time just like wells regenerate water.

The main issue imo is that the civilizations right now are always the same. You find a place with soil/ponds and enough trees for kindling and you start your town. Every town will start with the same starting conditions and it will grow essentially the same. This means towns do not have variety like they always had in real life.

In real life towns weren't always made for the same reasons. One town might be a "mining town" created because the area was iron rich or copper rich. Another town might be a farming town having rich soil and abundant water. Another town might be a fishing town because of the availability of sea resources. Another town was created artificially for government or a trading town because it happens to be in the middle of a trading route.

We have no such diversity in OHOL. Every town is the same. Every town has the same resources. You get essentially the same life in every town depending on the "town progress". If every town is the same there is no reason for trade, war, conquest, colonization, expansion.

If you want to rework resources somehow, then you can make it so that towns need to either specialize or make it accessible to have satellite towns. If a farming town grew enough but needed iron for example. They could go the distance and settle a second town where iron is available. Maybe not a permanently settlement at first, but maybe some food storage, some infrastructure (like horse parking). Then over time it could make sense to have a more sizable and permanent town pumping out iron not only for that farming town but also for other farming towns around them. Maybe the mining town would be 100% dependent on food coming from these farm towns.

Maybe iron on mines could regenerate based on how many people live nearby or add some sort of labor intensive process to retrieve iron that needs to be processed on the same place.

I had this idea of "regions" which would be a sort of virtual region on top of the biomes we have right now. These regions would be specialized in resources. Maybe in one you could have iron ore. On another you could grow tomatoes/onions, on another you had shrimps and fish. This could also allow for more trade with other towns.

Right now it's too hard to make a temporary settlement where food isn't available. Food takes too much space and you can only take yourself. If you had like wagons that could carry more people and more food then maybe you could have a sort of trading caravan which could carry more stuff around.

Booklat1 · 2019-04-23 04:18:33

Thaulos wrote:

Resources can be made to be infinite long term but finite on the short term. You can have mines regenerate iron over time just like wells regenerate water.

but they should be finite long term, thats the whole point

if it regens we have no reason to migrate

DestinyCall · 2019-04-23 04:30:26

For me, the most interesting stories and the most enjoyable lives have always started from working together and building closer relationships with other people in the village. Not from conflict, theft or violence. Violent lives just make me want to stop and play something else for a while. This game is at its best when the village is working together and growing and becoming something greater because we are all working together to create something amazing. I love helping an Eve construct a small village from a tiny camp. The feeling of bringing back a mouflon and having the whole village cheer in excitement is so rewarding. It makes me feel like a hero. I love finishing a big project, like re-positioning a bakery or making a new well. I love meeting interesting people and doing something I've never done before - like the one life where I was the daughter of a "priestess" who worshiped the Holy Fire and I spent my life tending the flames and cooking fire-based yum foods for the village. It was fun and amusing and gave me a reason to teach my daughters to carry on our traditions.

I don't think this game needs more reasons to fight each other. People will fight each other over nothing at all. I think this game needs more reasons to care about each other and more ways to help each other. If the goal is to make more interesting and emotionally-moving stories, I think that should be the goal because I can't be emotionally moved by a story without any meaningful characters. I want to make better villages where mother and daughter have a reason to care about each other and work together and treasure the lives they share with each other. Where you come together to accomplish what you couldn't do by yourself.

Now if the goal is to stimulate trade, it is NOT just a question of finite resources driving competition for dwindling necessities. Food is not a viable trade good under most circumstances and neither is iron. All of our villages are largely self-sufficient. They don't NEED anything from a different village and that is as it should be. We should be able to make the bare necessities wherever we end up. Trade goods are going to be things people WANT but can't just make themselves easier than trading someone for them. Dyes for making colored clothing, precious metals for making jewelry or fancy clothing, herbs and spices needed to make certain yum foods or the finished products made from these components ... these are the kinds of things that might make for viable trade goods. If we had a reasonable way to trade them for something we wanted/needed and someone close enough to carry out the exchange.

I think the infinite nature of the map is only part of the problem. I think the map needs more defined "regionality". Some areas where certain resources are more common and other areas where those same resources are pretty scarce. An actual sense of moving from one distinct region to another. The patchwork nature of the biomes in the current map creates a melting pot effect. Biomes are too mixed and too small and too easily accessible to each other. If you want something and can't find it close to town, you just keep running or rideing until you find the next biome or the next one or the one after that. It is random but, in a strange way, extremely predictable.

It would be a major game changer, but altering the way biomes spawn might be a significant step in the right direction. Maybe have discrete "hot zones" and "cold zones". Deserts and jungles spawning together in the hot zones. Tundra and badlands spawning in the cold zones. The rest of the neutral biomes, swamp, grasslands, and prairies forming large neutral zones that separate hot from cold. This would create more towns where certain resources are naturally further away and more difficult to acquire independently. If your village is located near the border of a hot biome, you have access to a completely different range of materials compared with a neighboring village that is closer to a cold zone. Trade might be possible, under the proper circumstances. Certain villages would have a reason to specialize in a particular direction, based on where they were positioned and what resources they have available for use.

pein · 2019-04-23 04:33:26

why family should matter?
there is no logical reason yet
sure you could allow people to go back, that would be nice but kinda against what you worked for so far
sure, people want to continue the lineage, but lot of people are bored of that so they just do whatever to have their fun
last female of the town? sit tight, yum, raise babies, no thanks, i want to do tech, i don't really care about babies

link the population number to certain items to craft
my idea: each person is born with a necklace or can craft one easily or their mother can craft one
maybe the eve sets a home marker and take one off from it
similar to property fences, we need cheap resource to make each person a home marker/totem
putting the necklace on totem you increase the score
each time someone dies, the totem falls ( maybe 5 min delay)
so they can be used as female counter or population counter

now we got gen 2-4 camps having baby booms and gen 55 people either all banned or played too much to go back again
instead of a pop of 30 under 10 min then no girls
we need steady supply of girls, like 2 minimum each time
males and old ladies don't count, so basically 40% of population, that means each 20 min one or two girls minimum
if they starve then you need to wait or high roll like now but some supply of females is needed
also max population should be limited until you reach a certain tech level

lets say an axe allow to cut a tree, a butt log placed on the altar/totem whatever proves you got an axe, so the population inside the zone can be higher
like lot of strategies revolve around stacking supplies, making houses to increase pop, or population is needed for era advancement, tech or such
so maybe some recipes only work with team play
lets say 4 people need to hold 4 edges of a tent then you can have 5 more people to come
if they don't want to make a tent or don't know how to, they cant get more population
so basically higher tech and team work lure more babies to towns that care, work as team
now not sure what would really motivate people but maybe resource packs like rust airdrops a good idea
if the 10th person is born, then the city gets a package when the kid grows hair
maybe certain average age would give extra packages
lets say you got 2 elders, 2 old, 2 adult, 4 teenager, and 10 babies
the total age of people would determien if you can craft certain things
or get them for limited time like a "golden hoe" which has 10 times the uses and a time limit of 10 min
people need to use it or lose it
people hoarding soil would benefit from it than the ones who don't care

the number of eves should be lowered, and population increased
Like first 8 eves are primary and far from each other like 2000 tiles. each is a different color team.
then each new eve spawns near the same color, maybe equity based so the 8th eve gets neighbors first. they can trade, merge, fight. they would spawn much closer like 200 tiles.
if one eve family dies, other becomes primary
each cluster would be either a related family/nation.
maybe have some sort of similar sprites, randomize hair but everyone is same skin tone for example.
So instead of being born to family you could be born to a cluster and go back if you want to, and know how to,
This allows variety or continue projects. Also you care about multiple cities but not for all of them. If you join late is still bad bad the game could balance each cluster to have similar scores or higher population to improve the score, so they could work together to make their cluster better. But also allows extra eves with the catch of not being isolated if they are late.

Town scores and territories would be needed, like an eve could claim 50x50 around a totem
things inside it considered same town, maybe based on population extend it
Outposts need new totem and a band wagon for example, only allowed after having 15 people. that wagon could hold more items and help making new city faster.
Each cluster could have some goal, like finding an unique resource, building something on it

Maybe AI attacks, like bears or wolf attacks periodically to higher score teams, so we don't need griefers but some drama emerges.
Also bury people and get rid of decayed items, bones (make burial cheap or free), compost piles would increase score and fertility
all those thing on the open and long time not moved items would decrease it
some sort of organization methode like stockpile allowing only materials or food
also dirt roads for easier planning, similar to property fence, placeholder roads to signal ways which also decay if not taken care of. no speed boost or anything, just people cant plant on it
free tiles are highest tech right now

Not sure what would be an end goal.
Maybe oil usage would be higher, people would need to move near oil, make a capital there, then using oil make some very expensive building/structure which would win their team the round. Winning a round would give a family/team some unique items, animals, clothes, recipes, whatever. After a certain amount of rounds the server would be wiped. (or time, but rounds would allow a team to come back from a score of 9-0 to 9-10 for example)
So starting it early would be different from end.

This are just random ideas here, not sure what would motivate people to stick with a team (maybe a personal score or loyalty bonus)
Ofc people could swap team by suicide but then lose progress, still the variety would come from different families but they would be normally cluster locked.

One thing is sure: you need to use population as a resource. Right now lot of people just disturb, i can smith faster alone than with help, sure i can teach them or let them do it when it's not vital, but when a tool is desperately needed, i don't have the mood to wait them.
The example with tent: 4 people to perform an action. They need to understand you, need to help each other, they archive something together.
The thing is, people rarely leave cities, is dangerous. They starve or die to animals. So they want static jobs. There are no static jobs.
egg making is decent, a girl cooks eggs you gather more, she wont have time to go far, has a purpose.
board cutting similar, wins a bit of time, later you can use as buckets and carts
stew making is farming, a lot of actions and a nice end result
other than that? composting is boring, berry farming boring, guarding the carrot omg.
Gathering iron? Gathering resources for buildings? heck no, everyone loves building but hates gathering.

So supply packs might help, like temporary spots with iron or clay or something. People can follow signals and if they arrive in time they get stuff.

Other fun things? Maybe make a capture the flag mode. each family has a flag, defending yours and stealing others can give you some advantage.
Ofc for battles we need better fighting system, maybe non lethal. Also if they build around a flag, some sort of destruction which only works against other family structures. So the war is against other city structures not the families itself.

Family goals: connect point A and B with a line of rails. We kinda need transporting people too

For short term, i think you should revise the Eve spiral and solve the storage, decay and organization issues.
Dirt roads would help a lot, cheaper burials and poop moving. Some sort of decaying on food items (pepper, tomato and wheat, if they arent moved for x amount of time they should signal it, then decay).

Fences pull families apart, we need something that brings them together and fight others rather than inside battles.
I can imagine a private bakery where you sell stuff for people who gather for you. But it's a lot of pre setup and people don't care about shared resources, things will fall apart.

futurebird · 2019-04-23 04:33:49

The games I have found least enjoyable have been the ones where I lost all faith in the other players and couldn't trust anyone and felt worried the whole time that someone would break or take what I was working on. This happens now even though we have no serious resources problems. I don't think we need artificial pressure of this kind. And I don't think it's a bad thing that it happens now, it gives the times that places WORK and are efficient and friendly more meaning.

But, there is an odd idea that if you decrease resources, shrink the map, make more bottlenecks people will stand around and talk less, and get more invested or work together to fight other groups of people. But, what that pressure really will do is further fragment the social fabric that we have, people will still goof off if they have some food in their bag. (and I don't really see this as something that needs fixed) people will be more individually protective of their own life because that comes first, so more hiding food, more sneaking around to make a back pack behind a tree, maybe even killing people to get their stuff would become a real thing.

The pressure would make it harder to coordinate an attack on another group. It would be individual play each person for themselves for the most part.

futurebird · 2019-04-23 04:35:05

I like pein's ideas about needing to advance tech or having a low population cap that could kill your town. That might get more people involved in tech!

Spoonwood · 2019-04-23 04:40:04

jasonrohrer wrote:

As I've said many times, I want your decisions in the game to matter, at all levels. I want running a successful village to be hard, and I want you to care enough to get good at handling that challenge. I want town leadership to be necessary, because the challenge is so difficult, and I want disagreements and politics to unfold around that leadership. I want the survival of your family to really matter to you.
And somehow, I want the survival of your family to really matter to you NOW, in this life, and not based on benefits that are going to happen in future lives (like the ability to return to the same village and work on your own pet projects). That particular part may be impossible, so I may have to bend the design a little bit... but I want your family to really matter to you, and I want you to prioritize its survival over the survival of other families, when push comes to shove.

Someone might say that it strains credulity that you have wanted this consistently in light of the property fence update, the high society update, both radio updates, (4), the plane update, the car update (6), the black gold (or 'oil') update, and the two apocalypse updates (9).

Also, I have a feeling that someone smart enough could just spend a series of lives as a wild Eve and walk to neighboring towns and help them out and not care so much about their lineage. Those towns might do better overall, and the stories end up more interesting, because it's people co-operating instead of being at odds with each other.

jasonrohrer wrote:

And that story, as one example, doesn't currently ever happen in the game. Even if two families were near each other.

Sure. Perhaps though that's because the playerbase find cooperative stories more interesting and useful than competitive ones.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Same with a story about us losing faith in our leader and deciding collectively to replace them. I'm not saying there should be a necessary leader in every town at every moment, but it should be possible in some towns some of the time.

Leadership isn't compatible with people playing for their families. It's compatible with people playing based on fear of the leader or fear of the bad reputation of the elites or masses.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Likewise with laws, trade, war, etc. I don't want to make a game about those things specifically, but I want those things to occur naturally in the game sometimes. This one time, pressure mounted between two villages, and finally a gasket blew, and we were involved in a full-blown war.

That would mean more danger to players as individuals. Consequently, they would care about their families LESS, since their game would more come on their line. Masses of people won't go to war voluntarily in a game. In real life conscription exists because armies haven't even gotten enough people for their desires to volunteer. So why would people risk their virtual necks instead of just abandoning their silly family that got them into a conflict for no good reason? Also, let's say that my family got into a war because our leader was greedy and selfish. Will I care about my family more? No. I'll care LESS about my family because either they are that bad leader, or they are stupid enough to follow such a leader.

jasonrohrer wrote:

I think that the new property fences are a step in the right direction here, and I myself have already seen some interesting new stories come out of them.

No people hoarding things is NOT a sign of people caring about their families more. It's a sign of players caring LESS about their families, since they are selfish and non-productive with respect to family resources.

jasonrohrer wrote:

I tried to start a private milkweed farm during my life with my kids, and unbeknownst to me, my younger sister tried to do the same thing on the other side of town. Hers was much more successful and ended up flourishing beautifully. Mine ended up pretty much failing by the end of my life. At one point, I had to beg her to borrow a hoe that I needed to get mine off the ground.

Oh, you HAD to? Then you don't care about your family much, since they WILL need another hoe (or batch of skewers) later. You played as if you cared LESS about your family, since you weren't doing things which would get your descedants more resources.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Then my kids forgot to save seeds from their first crop, so I had to beg her again for seeds to resow.

So, you had to take time to talk to her. You were NOT playing in your family's interest by having this second milkweed farm, because you wouldn't have had that seed problem if you had farmed with her. Co-operating would have come as in the family's interest. But your own play suggests that co-opeartion came as less likely to happen since you wanted a fence for YOUR farm, instead of co-operating with someone for everyone's milkweed farm.

jasonrohrer wrote:

It was actually a bit humiliating, and it made me jealous, and I thought briefly about killing her and taking over her farm.

Not enough fertile females is the death of lineages. You thought about killing her? Well, you would then more directly do something to harm your lineage. That's caring LESS about your lineage, and more about your own personal pet project.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Anyway, it was a new story. Normally, I'd just walk over and pick the milkweed, or grab the hoe. Having to ask, and having her trust me, was a new type of story. I also saw a kid come up to my sister and explain that he needed rope to make snares. She had to decide whether to give him rope or not. Good stuff.

It's only good if you want people to care LESS about their family surviving than before. You were thinking about killing off one of the fertile females it sounds like. "Good stuff"?! More like you don't even want to play for your own lineage's sake now because of your game design choices.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Less off-the wall is something where OHOL is always played right around the center, instead of an auto-spiral exploring further and further into fresh territory. Resources will run out, and people will need to go further and further on their own, which will eventually become impractical.

Probably not actually. Planes would actually ensure family survival in such a scenario. Infinite water exists, and people can generate more resources in tutorial areas. I mean raiding tutorial areas with planes is possible. One family also messes with fertility mechanics, since temperature and yum wouldn't matter to your family, only to whether you were the fertile female who got the baby next.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Looking for thoughts here.

Decrease fertility for anyone making a property fence. Really, end the whole notion of private property just based on your experience since your temptation to kill, what I assume was, a fertile woman of your blood is just bad for the probability of a lineage surviving. Reversing something like a car or radio, I don't think so practical. The solution in general lays in coming up with designs where the technology, food, and clothing updates will make it more likely for players flocking to the latest thing to make something useful. I think that milkweed pressure starts to increase when you have the iron based tools to make buckets and cart. So maybe some sort of new hoe in the game that could only get made via use of a bowsaw somehow which allows for the tilling of crops that generate thread instead of milkweed. That way farmers care more about needed tools like buckets and carts for their children.

Or maybe make it so that the pies all have different colors for players choosing to yum to increase their fertility.

Or maybe killing a girl or fertile woman in a lineage automatically results in a curse point to a player (or maybe two curse points).

Or maybe make it so that oases of perfect temperature spots exist, that way smart players have a place to put their children and do more for their children's future and not rely on a nurse who drains her pips by overfeeding children. I mean the temperature overhaul did that effectively. Since enough people don't understand pip drain rate all that well, people played like they cared more about their lineage surviving before the temperature overhaul than they do now with all of the overfeeding that goes on (at least I think it's worse since the temperature overhaul than now... it has to happen sometime, of course).

Make clothing set more insulating than rabbit fur clothes, sealskin coats, and wolf hats, that LOOK good, that way people will end more likely to wear clothes which give them good temperature (the high society clothes are inferior to rabbit fur clothes for the most part with respect to fertility).

Bottom line: make game mechanics and updates that increase the likelihood of people playing co-operatively and increase the likelihood of them playing in such a way that they have more yum and better temperature.

Booklat1 · 2019-04-23 04:46:10

guys, more challenges doesnt necessarely mean create more conflict, they just open more opportunity for both it and cooperation

working hard together doesnt exist in a world without issues

Last edited by Booklat1 (2019-04-23 04:46:38)

Portager · 2019-04-23 04:54:33

I am one of the few long term users I know of who actually cares A LOT about my families from what I can tell, that is not a diss on anyone else, but I see a clear difference in my play style compared to that of others. I find rote building and crafting to be very boring. I would rather make a friend with a fellow baby at the fire and then hang out with them, building stuff and partaking in some light roleplay together. There is also nothing more satisfying to me then seeing my kids grow up. I literally believe that children are the most precious resource in this game, they are awesome. Who doesn't want to see their kid grow up and pass on the family name, and become surrounded by kids of their own?

There is a big problem here though Jason, and that is that the majority of the power user community does not like roleplaying, and many do not like being parents. There are only a handful of us veterans out there who would rather hold our children at the fire and tell them the history of our family then work on building pet projects. Im not hating on other veteran users, or saying that they all dislike raising kids and partaking in LIGHT roleplaying, but my observation is that most do not like the kind of "story" based gaming you envision. That is their right, and their playstyle. They are all cool people, and I enjoy talking with them and playing with them none the less.

So my recommendation is this, you need new family mechanics in this game that encourage people to get to know one another.

I do believe it is time to add an adoption mechanic of some kind to allow male players the right to formally adopt abandoned babies, and have these babies appear in their family tree as adopted children.

I also believe that it is time to have defined community roles. A family head who is bestowed the honor by the previous head, and creates an unbreaking succession of leadership. Actual cooks, farmers, smiths etc, roles given by the head. These roles would not have to mandatorily be followed, but there could be incentives or disincentives to make the player follow their role (ie berry bushes planted by a non farmer take longer to generate new berries). If they dont like their role, they can leave and after clearing so many miles from the village, their role could vanish.

I believe that placing spawn points closer to existing camps would also help to cause more tensions.

Please consider adding some new family elements. I think that would be much preferable to completely redoing the map, which is much beloved by the community.

Last edited by Portager (2019-04-23 04:56:24)

Tarr · 2019-04-23 04:55:21

Spoonwood wrote:

Or maybe make it so that the pies all have different colors for players choosing to yum to increase their fertility.

I mean that's reasonable. You can already change the sprites of different pies if you wanted but of course that doesn't help other players.

Spoonwood wrote:

Or maybe killing a girl or fertile woman in a lineage automatically results in a curse point to a player (or maybe two curse points).

Ludicrous idea to say the least. The concept you have to bite the bullet because all griefers would play female is silly. There's a reason people tend to have higher female murder rate than male murder rate and that's because more people actively play female than male.

Spoonwood wrote:

Or maybe make it so that oases of perfect temperature spots exist, that way smart players have a place to put their children and do more for their children's future and not rely on a nurse who drains her pips by overfeeding children. I mean the temperature overhaul did that effectively. Since enough people don't understand pip drain rate all that well, people played like they cared more about their lineage surviving before the temperature overhaul than they do now with all of the overfeeding that goes on (at least I think it's worse since the temperature overhaul than now... it has to happen sometime, of course).

Slow fires are perfect tiles as long as they're not in a hot biome or inside a building. This of course means that people setting babies on a fire inside a building are derps, and children that don't stand next to the fire are either not caring about their drain rate or too new to know better. I don't think the temperature has much correlation to whether people care about their lineage so that bit seems a little silly.

Spoonwood wrote:

Make clothing set more insulating than rabbit fur clothes, sealskin coats, and wolf hats, that LOOK good, that way people will end more likely to wear clothes which give them good temperature (the high society clothes are inferior to rabbit fur clothes for the most part with respect to fertility).

Newest clothing is a set it and forget it style. It's not warmer than rabbit fur because you're supposed to create it and not have to worry about whether or not your kids are smart enough to make clothes. You making yourself something fancy will always benefit your future children unless lost. The bell town before katetown almost always had a huge surplus of clothes which made it so less overall nude people existed.

Dodge · 2019-04-23 05:02:15

Right now the world is flat, why couldnt it be round like IRL

And limited to 5-6k tiles

Now if the entire map was generated on server restart + wipe for the first restart, it could be possible to control the number of some ressources for example limiting the number of iron mines and tarry spot to 5-10 on the whole map.

And since iron is essential, iron mines could be upgraded with a digging machine that would require large amounts of iron/steel to produce but give back mined ressources when firing the engine with kerosene

Oil rigs would regenerate like the old water wells used to and villages would trade and fight over oil/iron and the control over the mining and oil rigs.

In that scenario it would be actually possible to fuck up so bad that every important ressource is depleted, long term survival is not possible anymore and apocalypse is the only way to start new (which should generate a new map).

Spoonwood · 2019-04-23 05:06:55

futurebird wrote:

Not seeing how this leads to going higher up the tech tree, this is more of a fall of civilization scenario than a building one. The idea of a limited map and trying to push people together to fight through scarcity sounds not very fun to me and also not very realistic in some ways. Farming gave people more food than they can eat, advanced farming more food and clothing and other resources than anyone could manage to use. Scarcity will give you conflict and fights maybe wars but it won't give your growth and tech and accomplishment and prosperity.
Maybe a limited map with more upgrades to resources could be good. Or just soften the area ban so people can bum in to each other more.
I'm not really interested in beating other players to a resource I want to help them. That's more fun and right now you can choose to do either.

I agree with this. I don't have any interest in this whole "my family must be doing this either". The whole notion of having to care about my family, while the other family is gross, disgusting, and even evil is just something I don't like. Competition is one thing, but not sharing isn't something I like. I personally do NOT want us to care about our families to the point that we wish to harm other families.

BladeWoods · 2019-04-23 05:20:08

For a way to increase family value, it might be hard to implement, but if you could visually see or watch your living descendants after you die that would be cool. Only your descendants. Not other families. Not your sisters' descendants. Should encourage caring for your kids over other random kids.

I played two lives today and they were in two different multi-family towns. There was no fighting, only cooperation.

To encourage conflict,
What if families magically can't pick up or use anything at all made by another family. Unless that other family dies.
Maybe we could see some conflict then, but trade would be impossible. I find your goals of both trade and conflict to be kinda antagonistic.

What if killing a member of a different family extends your lifespan and increases the fertility of your women.
That could really get people killing each other.

Last edited by BladeWoods (2019-04-23 05:23:29)

Spoonwood · 2019-04-23 05:35:44

jasonrohrer wrote:

I want the survival of your family to really matter to you.

That's not compatbile with wars. People would resent leaders for wars, because that means endangering their sons. But, then there exists less caring for family overall, because the leaders/instigators of wars are hated. The survival of the family matters less with wars, because there would be more fracturing of the extended family structure with them. You really need to rethink the whole war idea. You also really need to rethink A LOT of your other ideas about this game if you want people to care about their families Jason. And A LOT of your previous updates and whether they headed in that direction also.

Though admittedly the following comes as a bit hard to discren, even the temperature ovrerhaul made it harder to care about your family, since before it people could leave a child near them while doing a task and not overfeed the child thus not pressuring their food supply as much. Now people throw their child by the fire, and the nurse comes as more likely to overfeed the child, so less provision for descendants comes as likely to happen than before the temperature overhaul, implying that people play in such a way that they don't seem to care as much about the quality of life for their children.

Last edited by Spoonwood (2019-04-23 05:39:11)

Dodge · 2019-04-23 06:04:55

Also if the world is round there could be islands, grassland/prairire/swamp/rocky would be on main island where everybody spawns since it has the essential stuff to start a civilisation and desert, jungle , thundra would all be on separate ones so you would need ships to transport ressources.

Small faster ships with low storage,Merchant ships, gallions with cannons to sink others ship and steal their goods

OminousBladeBlank · 2019-04-23 06:06:31

I like your goals, Jason. I want the game to have more tension. I want wars to happen. I like theft. I like property. But it DOES NOT help you care about your line. It makes the game break into smaller cohorts within families, and divides them. I like it. But it's much easier to be greedy.

emilyjb2 · 2019-04-23 06:13:33

I reiterate what others have said: there’s little reason to trade when the map is so homogenous, and each town is a self-contained ecosystem. In order to facilitate trade (and culture). Regions of the map need to specialize. And, we need to be able to live with different starting resources. As someone else said, we need desert towns and snow towns and jungle towns. Right now, you NEED grassland/swamp to survive. As such, every town looks and functions so similarly that they’re almost forgettable.

My suggestion is to greatly expand the existing biomes and fill them differently. Biomes need to be larger. And towns should be able to flourish within these biomes without needing too many resources from neighboring biomes for basic-level survival.

Maybe iron and other metals stay in the mountains. But there should be an expansion of wood and stone tools. Maybe they break easier (there’s still a reason to get iron), but it stops being ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY.

Clothing and food should differ between biomes. In the snow, you can’t farm, but you hunt seals and fish. You clothes yourself with yak furs and build igloos. In the tropics, you farm yams and bananas and sugarcane. You tame elephants for riding. You build homes with palm fronds and make mosquito nets for protection.

We need replacements for clay and sheep and berries in ALL biomes. Nothing needs to function the same, but we need to be able to live (even if it’s difficult... grassland would probably always be easier than desert for instance) in all biomes. And biomes need to be made bigger (like 2000k tiles).

That way, we have diversity in Eve camps and early camps. Large towns would require resources form more places, but would retain some “uniqueness” based on their starting points.

You could trade bananas for fish and increase everyone’s yum potential. Trade iron for a pack animal. Or better clothing. Make it so trade makes life easier, without making life impossible to begin with.

Specialization would more accurately replicate human history and encourage the development of culture. Truly advanced tech would still need resources from all over the map, which would require multi-village interaction and trading.

It would be a huge overhaul, but I think it would accomplish at least some of what you’re seeking.

Additionally, I want to reiterate what was said above. Making existing items scarcer to try and force conflict and trade sounds like an extremely unpleasant playstyle. Make more luxury goods and isolate them to specific parts of the map. Think spices, dyes, cloth, jewels, wine, etc. People LOVE personalizing their character, and we already have “drug dealers” growing and passing out mushrooms. If you expanded upon that concept and gave people goods that made the game more fun on an individual level, I think trade would evolve organically.

futurebird · 2019-04-23 06:35:50

emilyjb2 wrote:

Additionally, I want to reiterate what was said above. Making existing items scarcer to try and force conflict and trade sounds like an extremely unpleasant playstyle. Make more luxury goods and isolate them to specific parts of the map. Think spices, dyes, cloth, jewels, wine, etc. People LOVE personalizing their character, and we already have “drug dealers” growing and passing out mushrooms. If you expanded upon that concept and gave people goods that made the game more fun on an individual level, I think trade would evolve organically.

Well said! And that kind of personalization will lead to conflicts and stories. They will be organic and as always people have the freedom to be bad or good greedy or helpful. I like that that's a choice in the game it give the positive interactions more meaning and creates real enemies that you want to defend your family and town from. People bring their own personality to the game, and their alter egos. I don't like the ideas about "you can only pick up your families tools by magic" that isn't as interesting as someone who wants to build a shrine but I think it's a wast of time and we have to work out who gets to use the adobe.

As for war you have to build culture and group identity before that will happen. Some people won't ever fight some will always want to fight. We already have conflicts in the game and with more social complexity that will grow. I love the drug dealers. That's fun. More content that facilitates that type of thing would be great.

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